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Same Publisher, Same Trend for Keyword “slots”

ASO

General

This week, our ASO team came across another very interesting trend happening with iOS keyword rankings. It’s already known that there is a correlation in Android keyword rankings for different apps belonging to the same publisher. As of January of 2017, we found a very strong correlation in iOS keyword rankings for “slots” for slots apps belonging to the same publishers.

Below are keyword rankings over time for four slots apps that belong to the same publisher, let’s call it Publisher X. Starting on January 23rd, the keyword ranking for “slots” for each app started to follow a nearly identical trend.

We noticed a very similar thing happening with four other slots apps that belong to another publisher, Publisher Y.

…And then the same for three slots apps by another publisher, Publisher Z.

We checked if a similar pattern existed with other keywords like “casino”, “free slots”, and “slot machines”, but there was no correlation to the same extent as with “slots”.

What this means for your slots apps

There are a couple of takeaways and implications from this finding.

First, if you’re a publisher with multiple slots apps and notice an unexplainable change in the keyword rankings for “slots” for one of the apps, you should check for changes in the listings of your other apps. If you stopped aggressively targeting “slots” in one of your apps, it may cause the keyword ranking of all of your apps to drop for that word (and visa versa).

Another takeaway is that there is a strategy worth trying to boost your apps’ ranking for “slots”. You can publish an additional app that heavily targets “slots” that will also have a good chance of ranking high for the word (ranking high for such a keyword requires significant installs, engagement, etc.). However, this strategy is merely based on a theory at this point. We do not have insight that this trend is based on causation, rather than just a correlation.

We will continue to keep our eye on this trend and provide updates on our blog. Stay tuned!For any questions or inquiries, feel free to contact us!